The NAO recommended that the agency strengthen control over the ICW IT programme, and make sure that the system supports, rather than leads, its work to streamline caseworking processes.

“We found [the IT project] had suffered from a loss of focus, poor governance structures and optimism bias in planning and reporting, although the agency took steps to address these issues during 2011-12,” the NAO said in its report.

Some of the savings are expected to be due to a reduction in the number of staff by 4,500 full-time equivalents, but a lack of communication and integration between different operations at the agency led to it cutting staff more quickly than planned, resulting in the need for new staff to be hired to deal with peaks in demand.

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Amyas Morse, head of the NAO, said: “The UK Border Agency and the Border Force deserve credit for taking on an ambitious programme of change, but both organisations face a steep climb to ensure this work delivers both value for money and a good service.

“The real leadership test will be whether the agency can transform casework processing without relying solely on new IT, and whether the Border Force can improve its workface practices and raise productivity.”

The NAO welcomed the Border Agency’s plans to address the project delays by preparing a new transformation programme, which will reduce management layers, for launch in the autumn.

“The ICW is central to our plans to modernise caseworking. It will enable us to move applications online, introduce standardised caseworking IT systems and manage the workflow of cases better,” the agency said in the plan.

“Caseworkers will receive cases with all the information they need to take a decision. Some stages of applications will be automated and there will be less time-consuming data entry. This will enable us to reduce staff without creating unmanageable workloads.”

It added: “We estimate that redesigning processes and automating work could improve casework productivity by up to 60 percent in some areas.”

We have been hearing for years how CIOs and senior IT professionals need to bury the hatchet with line of business managers and, instead of focusing on the latest bleeding-edge technology for its own sake, seek to better understand the overall strategic objectives of their organisations.